New Paizo SF RPG: Competitor with Traveller?

[ShawnDriscoll]

- My ship uses chemical rockets to get around and reaction mass. Tell me how to calculate travel times and reaction mass loss using Mongoose Traveller.

Easy. Mongoose Traveler is not a simulator. It's a role-playing game. I've never used math for the ships it does have in the rules. And players certainly don't care about all that.

- I want to make a setting where ships travel using HyperDrive through another dimension that has "terrain" in that is defined by stars and planets and other masses. Show me the hyperdrive tables, advice for the effects of such a drive on a setting, and how to calculate the mass of the hyperdrive engines for a ship.

If you can imagine doing such feats, why can't you imagine what you'll need for it? No one else can solve your imaginary problem at the table. Again. Players don't care how much mass something is. If an argument happens at a table about it, something else is going on there instead of role-play.

- Rules for uploaded intelligences, and how they can download into vehicles, robots or biological bodies.

You just said what your character is doing. Except for the rules part that the character doesn't concern them self with. There are no rules for opening car doors in the game either. Yet characters always seem to find ways into them.

(maybe these are in expansions like High Guard, I don't know. But they're not in the corebook).

Analysis paralysis.

 

[fusor]

Ah right. You ask (no, demand) that I give you examples, which you then armwave away by shifting the goalposts. Very disingenuous of you, but not surprising given your antagonistic posting history.

And I don't care if the players don't care about them. _I_ care about these things, and I'm the one who would (hypothetically) want to make a setting that incorporates them, and the fact remains that Traveller does not provide me the means to do so. Therefore I must look to other scifi RPGs to provide those things.

These are things that I expect to be in a modern science-fiction gaming rulebook, particularly one that is supposed to be adaptable to any scifi background. They are not in Traveller.

 

[ShawnDriscoll]

Ah right. You ask (no, demand) that I give you examples, which you then armwave away by shifting the goalposts. Very disingenuous of you, but not surprising given your antagonistic posting history.

Just curious what your mindset is, as far as role-playing goes. And if you'll crack under pressure if players at your table pick at things.

And I don't care if the players don't care about them. _I_ care about these things, and I'm the one who would (hypothetically) want to make a setting that incorporates them, and the fact remains that Traveller does not provide me the means to do so. Therefore I must look to other scifi RPGs to provide those things.

Are you a referee, or not?

These are things that I expect to be in a modern science-fiction gaming rulebook, particularly one that is supposed to be adaptable to any scifi background. They are not in Traveller.

You're confusing setting with system. A fatal referee error.

 

[fusor]

Just curious what your mindset is, as far as role-playing goes. And if you'll crack under pressure if players at your table pick at things.

Why is what happens at my table any of your concern at all? Are you really so arrogant as to think you're the ultimate judge of everyone else's games? (you certainly seem to act like you do).

You're confusing setting with system. A fatal referee error.

And all you ever do is write smug, smartass one-liners - what's your point? Are you ever going to usefully contribute to a discussion, or just shoot pithy barbs at people?

Whatever. Go troll someone else.

 

[ShawnDriscoll]

Why is what happens at my table any of your concern at all? Are you really so arrogant as to think you're the ultimate judge of everyone else's games? (you certainly seem to act like you do).

I just like to know how others referee their games.

And all you ever do is write smug, smartass one-liners - what's your point? Are you ever going to usefully contribute to a discussion, or just shoot pithy barbs at people?

You came in here stating you can't get Traveller to work. That it's unusable and all. So of course I'm going to ask questions.

Whatever. Go troll someone else.

And, of course, include any name-calling.
Of course.

 

[fusor]

You came in here stating you can't get Traveller to work. That it's unusable and all. So of course I'm going to ask questions.

Apparently your reading comprehension skills are lacking, because I said no such thing. Try reading and responding to what people say, not what you think they said.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

Multiple tech levels don't really mean it's generic on their own - the OTU is actually pretty specific. There's only one way to do FTL (Jump drive, with jumps taking a week), interstellar communications is limited by the speed of travel, it has feudal social classes baked into the Social Standing, the races are pretty specific, etc. The retro-ness comes from the computers being vastly oversized (and limited), being based more on the 70s idea of that a computer is a big mainframe-sized box which can only do a handful of things at a time. Heck, they even use jump tapes.

Quite, Traveller is very sixties-SF. Rather grungy low-tech. Somewhat realistic without going into too much detail. (To be fair the computers stopped being huge quite a few editions ago.)

Aaaaaand that's why I like Traveller.

If you want to have a transhumanist setting where people (and bioroids and uploaded intelligences) sail the seas of hyperspace with quantum computers and can instantly communicate over lightyears, you've got a fair bit of work to do if you want to adapt Traveller's rules to that - it's not impossible, but that stuff isn't there in the rules already for a GM to springboard from. The closest Traveller got to that was TNE's "Fire Fusion and Steel" which genuinely did provide a huge number of alternative tech options, along with the possible consequences of using them on a setting.

Traveller is a toolbox with many components. The rules for what you describe could be added without too much fuss, but you have left the OTU setting far behind. It would imply a completely different setting, far beyond what a few paragraphs in FFS could cover.

But such a setting would probably better be marketed as another game.

 

[ShawnDriscoll]

Apparently your reading comprehension skills are lacking, because I said no such thing. Try reading and responding to what people say, not what you think they said.

So Traveller works fine for you. And it isn't problematic for you at all. And you're not an ageist.

I guess we're in agreement then.

 

[rust2]

These are things that I expect to be in a modern science-fiction gaming rulebook, particularly one that is supposed to be adaptable to any scifi background. They are not in Traveller.

True, but it seems impossible to design a science fiction roleplaying game which covers all possible fields of science fiction from steampunk like Space 1889 to transhumanism like Eclipse Phase, from real world physics like Stellar Wind to magic like Dragonstar. Such a game's core rulebook could rival a printed edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica in size. Therefore a game designer has to decide which fields of science fiction his game will be able to cover, and which fields to leave out. In the case of Traveller it covers the fields explored by the Golden Age science fiction, the mainstream science fiction of the time when it was designed, and it does this rather well. In my view it would border on unfair to expect more.

On a personal note, I left Traveller several years ago when my favourite setting proved incompatible with the Traveller system. It would have been far too much work to rewrite the Traveller rules to make them cover my setting's field of science fiction, and another system proved better for what I had in mind. So, I do understand very well where you are coming from. However, I do not see this as a problem of Traveller, because the Traveller toolbox simply cannot include all tools for all jobs. Which, in the end, is a good thing, as it ensures a healthy competition between science fiction roleplaying games and enables referees and players to choose among a variety of different games.

 

[Reynard]

I seems some people here are constantly expecting Traveller to achieve a higher standard than any other SFRPG or even FRPGs. Have I missed that one scifi game system that is universally able to cater to every possible setting a person can imagine? As far as I know, each RPG is written for a particular setting and the details, if not also the game mechanics, focus around it. The starship engines get you to the stars in a particular way and there are no gigantic rules section describing an infinite number of FTL systems. Weapons are a particular flavor and you don't need the Supplement from Hell to pick and choose every possible variant. How thick would the core book need to be to have every possible electronic device and implant to satisfy everyone's special view of what electronics and organics should be?

If you really want that level of control over your sandbox you should get either the basic HERO system or Mutants and Masterminds which have universal construction rules for ANYTHING you can imagine. HERO even has their own SFRPG - Star Hero - using those construction rules but I know someone would complain the setting is too restricted and not universal. There's the rub, even a universal system has setting limits. So I do not believe we'll see a transhumanism steampunk RPG based on any scifi ruleset already out there. You're going to have to build it yourself and then listen to others constantly whine it's far too restricted.

What Traveller does is give a particular set of rules and props as any game then says take these and go play outside. You don't have to follow the story we wrote unless you want to. Change things if you want, be creative and be happy. What's that, there's a new kid on the block? Go over and say hi and see what the kid is like and go play with them too. We'll still be here.

 

[Condottiere]

When you boil it all down, what remains is the setting.

 

[fusor]

Apparently your reading comprehension skills are lacking, because I said no such thing. Try reading and responding to what people say, not what you think they said.

So Traveller works fine for you. And it isn't problematic for you at all. And you're not an ageist.

I guess we're in agreement then.

That's quite the feat of mental gymnastics there - I don't think even you know what on earth you're babbling about. Why are you still here? All you ever do is troll.

 

[fusor]

I seems some people here are constantly expecting Traveller to achieve a higher standard than any other SFRPG or even FRPGs.

GURPS Space managed it pretty well. As does Star Hero, which you mention. If Traveller wanted to be a universal scifi system then it certainly could have been - and FF&S made it that in the TNE era. But since TNE, that approach hasn't been used.

 

[rust2]

GURPS Space managed it pretty well. As does Star Hero, which you mention. If Traveller wanted to be a universal scifi system then it certainly could have been - and FF&S made it that in the TNE era.

Well, I own and have played all three of them, GURPS Space, Space Hero and TNE, and I would very much hesitate to consider them truly "universal". They have different problems than Traveller, but they also have their serious weaknesses, including fields of science fiction which they do not cover well, or not at all.

 

[ShawnDriscoll]

GURPS Space managed it pretty well. As does Star Hero, which you mention.

How obscure. No one buys those old books. So '90s. Anyway, since you seem to have found your holy grails there, go have fun. Or did you have more complaining about Traveller to do?

 

[fusor]

GURPS Space managed it pretty well. As does Star Hero, which you mention.

How obscure. No one buys those old books. So '90s. Anyway, since you seem to have found your holy grails there, go have fun. Or did you have more complaining about Traveller to do?

We're talking about Traveller and you're saying "no one buys those old books"? Hilarious. Man, as trolls go you really are a rank amateur.

(Also, GURPS and Hero are not "obscure". They had their heyday a while back, but so did Traveller).

 

[ShawnDriscoll]

GURPS Space managed it pretty well. As does Star Hero, which you mention.

How obscure. No one buys those old books. So '90s. Anyway, since you seem to have found your holy grails there, go have fun. Or did you have more complaining about Traveller to do?

We're talking about Traveller and you're saying "no one buys those old books"? Hilarious. Man, as trolls go you really are a rank amateur.

(Also, GURPS and Hero are not "obscure". They had their heyday a while back, but so did Traveller).

This is a Mongoose Traveller forum. You do know that, right? I do remember you. Almost a year ago, you came in this forum, alongside with Tenacious-Techhunter. You may have had another name back then. But now here you are again posting side-by-side in the forums with T-T. We thought you and T-T were the same guy actually.

Might still be the case.

 

[Tenacious-Techhunter]

Aaaaaand that's why I like Traveller. It's obviously an ALTERNATIVE universe similar but not ours. Things work different but they work. Computers are big on starships yet they have working energy weapons and the beginning of grav tech while our Earth thinks it's all scifi. Worlds around other stars are rich and suitable for human habitation whether they already have their own life or not. Stars are closer together. There's no transhumanism which, from all the descriptions, is very, very boring. Like Star Trek, people rely more on people than ultra-robotization. It's not scifantasy like the Star Wars RPGs with anime mysticism and futuristic samurais with impossible light sabers and moon sized starships. It's not retro steampunk ships. It's simplistic as in not getting overly complicated. It doesn't try to remake itself every time someone cries it's not based on today's reality rather it tends to tweak bits of reality while retaining its iconic flavor. It presents an easy imagining of fun science fiction. That's why it's been around for 40 years and will still remain relevant to RPGs while holding its own to newcomers such as Paizo's offering.

Invalidating false assumptions about science and technology is not “retaining iconic flavor”; failing to do so is dumping the baby out with the bathwater. My interest in Traveller extends only as far as it being the hardest of hard sci fi roleplaying games, with the LBB traditions of actually working out orbital math, albeit with the modern convenience of online calculators; any deviation from proven established fact is rather unacceptable. At some point, someone is going to give the Hab Cat database a good hard look, and decide there’s an RPG there waiting to happen. And when they do, if Traveller is still playing around with invalidated assumptions about technology, I hope they don’t pick Traveller.

 

[Tenacious-Techhunter]

How obscure. No one buys those old books. So '90s.

We're talking about Traveller and you're saying "no one buys those old books"? Hilarious. Man, as trolls go you really are a rank amateur.

(Also, GURPS and Hero are not "obscure". They had their heyday a while back, but so did Traveller).

GURPS Space, 4th edition, was released in 2006: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_GURPS_books#Genre_toolkits
It is not old.

 

[Reynard]

Same people who find Traveller science so incredulous and game damaging find it pure genius when Star Trek have tiny, low power teleporters and starships able to travel 60 parsecs instantly or Star Wars having a planet size weapon firing energy weapons through hyperspace at several different star systems and people could clearly see those energy streaks from other star system. The level of suspension of disbelief seems a bit biased. Oh, did I say a bit?

Traveller works, people play it and have fun. Still stands on its own blemishes and all.